With the Dark Horse Great Wall Challenge out of the way I can now concentrate on the Concept 2 Fall Team Challenge, although I will almost certainly put in fewer meters this half than in the first half as I will only be doing around 14Km as opposed to 21Km on each session.
Monday morning rowing was back to my usual 2K warm up (9:47.9), 10K steady state (46:28.9) and then 2246m of cool down (11:50.3) whilst continuing to watch episodes of Battlestar Galactica.
Tuesday was again supposed to be calesthenics, but I decided to have another rest day as I really didn’t feel like exercise, plus I had had a bad night, being woken up by a new app that sent me alerts for issues at work, which was only supposed to alert me during my daytime hours – so much for that!
Tuesday evening archery, I decided to do a Portsmouth round with my longbow as I don’t think anyone has so far claimed the club record for this and managed a score of 337 with 58/60 hits and 2 golds. My best end was 47, my worst 24, so quite a spread in consistency.
Wednesday morning rowing was a 2K warm up (9:59.9), 10K steady state (48:11.1) and then 2243m of cool down (11:46.6) whilst watching episodes of Battlestar Galactica.
Thursday morning rowing was a 2K warm up (9:59.0), 10K Time Trial (39:48.2) and then 2240m of cool down (11:10.1) whilst watching episodes of Battlestar Galactica.
The reason for the time trial is because it happened to be the Concept 2 Workout of the Day and I was going to do a 10K anyway, so why not put some effort into it today.
I possibly went out a little fast with 7:48.8 (1:57.2/500m) for the first 2K, and 7:46.1 (1:56.5/500m) for the second as I slowed down to 8:06.5 (2:01.6/500m) for the third, which gave me 19:33.3 (1:57.3/500m) for the first 5K. I then slowed even further to 8:20.4 (2:05.1/500m) for the fourth 2K which included a couple of pauses for breath that ultimately cost me a new PB. The last 2K was 7:46.4 (1:56.6/500m) giving me 20:14.9 (2:01.5/500m) for the second 5K, finishing up 14 seconds short of my previous PB, where I paced it better at around 1:58.0/500m for the entire 10K.
I ultimately finished the WOD 1/4 male Dark Horse Rowing, 1/5 all Dark Horse Rowing, 12/215 male 50-59, 12/239 all 50-59, 17/141 male UK, 17/152 all UK, 88/830 male worldwide and 89/915 all worldwide.
Friday morning Skiing, I decided to try John Healey’s Endurance workout from the October ‘This is not a challenge’ workout set: 4 x 3,000m @ 36, 38, 42, 44spm, 3:00 rest (SkiErg DF 81)
I started off with a 1,000m warm up (4:31.6), then into the main event.
First 3K in 15:31.1 (2:35.3/500m), Second 3K in 15:26.3 (2:34.3.500m), third in 13:47.5 (2:17.9/500m) and the fourth in 13:22.6 (2:13.7/500m).
It is much harder to maintain a given stroke rate on the SkiErg than the RowErg, partly because they are that much higher and tiny variations in the stroke seem to throw it off by 2-3spm, plus I kept getting random spikes that showed as 90+spm.
44spm was the hardest to maintain for the 3,000m, I almost feel like there should have had a 40spm set as well just to tidy up the numbers.
I find it odd that the jump from 36 to 38spm only moved my time by 5 seconds, yet when I moved to 42spm the time jumped by nearly 1:40 and then a further 25 seconds by jumping up to 44spm.
The 42 to 44 jump seemed reasonable, the 36 to 38 a bit small, but the 38 to 42 just seems huge.
Finished off with a 1,125m (6:12.4) cool down.
I enjoyed the workout, it certainly brought out a decent sweat.
Saturday masters rowing 4-, #3 seat again, steady state rowing and power ladders for a total of 10,284m.
Wandered into Staines for a bite to eat, I had Chicken Pad Thai from one of the vendors in the Saturday market before heading back to the boat club.
Once back I took my boat off the rack and set it on some trestles for a bit of minor maintenance, a new ‘2K’ bow ball,
as the old one was looking a little worn, a new number slot,
as the old one was missing, both of these items came from Neaves Rowing.
and I also swapped out the stroke side oarlock for an NK EmPower Oarlock,
After fitting, I then went through the various calibration settings on the NK SpeedCoach GPS to ensure it is setup correctly. Unfortunately I did not get to row my single as the coach had other plans.
For Saturday afternoon leisure rowing there were over 20 people present! So they launched two leisure quads, a leisure double and an eight.
I was in the 8+ in the number 6 seat, with a men’s four at the stern and a ladies four at the bow, it was a good fun outing with some power pieces towards the end for a total of 4,042m.
The high point was the 2K power piece where we had an average pace of 2:35.5 and covered the distance in 10:39.5.
I then came home and spent the rest of the afternoon with more weeding of the front drive in preparation for pressure washing.
Sunday morning masters rowing we were out in the same eight we had used for leisure rowing the previous afternoon and I was in the number 6 seat again which meant I did not need to make any adjustments. We had the two newer rowers with us once again as well as someone who had not rowed in a couple of years, so the outing was mainly drills, for a total of 8,182m.
After another walk into Staines for some lunch, it was back for the leisure rowing, this time I was with Josh again in a leisure double. Last time we were together I was stroke and Josh was steering, however this made for an unsettled boat as he pauses at the end of the stroke to check behind, then rushes the slide to catch up.
This time I had him row stroke so I could steer and also give him some coaching to slow down the slide and stop pausing at the finish, we had a good power segment of around 3,300m where we were rowing at a decent steady pace of 2:55/500m and completed the distance in 19:45, where I reminded him every time he rushed the slide but complemented him when he had a more fluid stroke. Josh was very pleased with the coaching session and we both felt that he had improved quite significantly during the outing. In total we covered 6,479m.
I then headed home and setup for pressure washing the driveway, donning my ‘NBC Suit‘ for the job.
Some might say that this level of PPE is somewhat overkill for pressure washing a driveway, but I can assure you I am usually splattered from head to toe whilst performing this task and would argue that I could actually do with a longer face guard as I was still splashed in the face a few times.
I only managed about 2/3 of the drive before the light dropped too far to be able to see what I was doing, so I packed up and will finish it off at some point later in the week.